Our Hearts—God's Temple

The heart of true Christians is God's private closet. And as in every house or building, there are some open places and some private closets, so is it here. God has his private chamber, and his retiring-place, which is the heart of every true Christian. He counts it not sufficient to dwell in his house at large, but he will dwell in the best part of it, the heart, and the affections. Therefore, 'he knocks at the doors of our hearts for entrance’ (Rev. 3:20), and his best children are glad he will reside in them. They set him up in the highest place of their souls and set a crown upon him; their desire is that God may govern and rule their whole life; they have no idol above God in their hearts.
Oh, what comfort arises to a Christian soul from the due meditation of this point. If we are God's house, then God will be our house; 'You are our habitation,' said Moses, 'from generation to generation' (Psa. 90:1). Wherever we shuffle in the world, now here and now there, yet in God we always have a home. He is ours, and we are his. What a comfort this is that we are God's house.
This should instruct us to labour that God may dwell largely and comfortably in us, to deliver up all to this keeper of our house and allow him to rule and reign in us. O beloved, it must concern us to cleanse and purify our hearts, so that we may entertain Christ and he may delight to abide and dwell with us. You know how terribly he took it when his house was made a den of thieves (Luke 19:46), and will he not take it much worse that our hearts should be made the very containers and cages of all manner of uncleanness? Our hearts should be as the holy of holies. Paul exhorts us 'to abstain from all filthiness both of flesh and spirit' (2 Cor. 7:1), for this cause 'that God may dwell amongst us' (2 Cor. 6:16); for, 'what communion has light with darkness?' (2 Cor. 6:14).

Devotional Readings taken from Puritan Richard Sibbes 'Refreshment for the Soul.'
The Church's Visitation, Works, vol. 1, pp. 374-75
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